Saturday, September 1, 2012

You might not actually be there, but nothing says you still can’t be a
douchey, know-it-all. Take a break from bashing your head against your
refrigerator in a fit of regret and self-loathing to get
up-to-the-minute news, interviews and photos from everyone who’s having
more fun than you this weekend.2. Clean your apartment.

Although living in abject squalor in an attempt to recreate the
familiar “Con Funk” in your own home may be tempting, why not shake the
Cheeto dust out of your bed sheets and get something productive done
today? Put, your sad, pathetic loneliness to good use and clean up your
shitty studio. All your friends may be at PAX having the time of their
lives, but at least you can have a habitable place to not get laid in.3. Eat an entire DiGiorno Stuffed Crust Frozen Pizza.

Go ahead, eat your feelings. There’s no one around to judge you.
Besides, chances are your friends are choking down worse garbage from
the concession stand. Of course they’re also up to their elbows in cool
PAX swag and you’re sitting at home, silently weeping at your Twitter
feed. So you might as well grab a bottle of Sriracha and your bong and
start filling the void in your soul with cheesy, crusty goodness.4. Have a one person cosplay party.

Sure, on the surface this suggestion might seem like the ultimate sad
sack, forever alone pity party, but think of it this way: Drake Laser,
steampunk vampire hunter, has way bigger problems than not having a PAX
pass. I mean, what if his zeppelin breaks down or his painted nerf gun
misfires when he’s under attack from chubby, corseted vampiresses?
Forget your troubles through the power of self delusion.... I mean
imagination. 5. Drink copiously

It should come as no surprise that we here at This Week in Whiskey are
ardent supporters of using alcohol as a solution to most of life’s
problems. So go ahead, get ripped. I mean really fucking tore up. Best
to do this alone in your apartment/zeppelin as you surely don’t want to
try and go out to any bars and find yourself reminded of all the cool
after parties you weren’t invited to. None of us want a repeat of last
year’s Master Chief helmet/booth babe/nacho cheese incident.That’s
all for now kiddies. Hope all of you (bastards) who made it out to PAX
are having a blast and to all you who couldn’t make it; try not to kill
yourself, there’s always next year.

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

No longer content to roll dice onto Mountain Dew-stained graph paper, I’ve taken my obsession with all things swords, magic, elves and dragons out of the basement and onto the field of battle.

For the uninitiated, LARPing stands for Live Action Role-Playing. Rules vary among different LARPing groups, but essentially you dress in medieval/fantasy garb and wail on one another with foam swords in a park or soccer field that will tolerate your weirdness. I’d describe it as full contact Dungeons & Dragons.

At first, I was hesitant to admit my newfound pastime. I mean, on the nerdo scale, LARPers fall somewhere just slightly below Furries. When questioned by my friends about the ever-growing armory in my closet, I told them I’d joined a medieval combat society, which I thought had a more socially acceptable ring to it.

I mean, when you think of a typical LARPer, what comes to mind? A chubby, asthmatic neckbeard with cool ranch Dorito breath right? Some forever alone motherfucker who’s real life is so pathetic that they resort to living in a fantasy world where they can be feared, respected and sucked off nightly by Liv Tyler? Yeah, me too. Yet I’ve been LARPing for several months now and not once have I felt the urge to don a silk dragon shirt and tuck it into my cargo shorts or pull my hair into a greasy ponytail. In fact, everyone I’ve met LARPing has been super cool and I’ve been having such a blast that all my friends, even the ones who scoffed at first, have gotten into it too.

Your interest is piqued, I can tell. Therefore, the following is a description of my experience thus far.

Now: my first order of business was to come up with a character to role-play. Eventually, I chose to be a human Ranger. Here is his backstory in brief:

Name: Davin Gale-Kin AKA Night-Arrow

Race: Human

Class: Ranger

Age: Speculated in his 23rd summer

Known associations: The Explorer’s Guild, The Brotherhood of the Rain

Alignment: Chaotic Good

This stoic and often grim Ranger, was once a feared assassin known only as "The Wolf" in the employ of High Magister Solonus Celeste.

Escaping from a life of crime and murder, Davin found solace and redemption in the rainy wilderness. Taken in by the native elves and trained in the arts of the ranger, Davin embarked upon a new life as a servant of good and justice.

Though he had at last found peace and purpose, Davin found himself swept up in the tide of a war that threatens the entire realm. Now Davin must fight for something greater than himself while struggling against his own violent inner nature and the beast he fears is forever a part of him, lurking just below the surface.

I know: cool, right?

So I had a character I wanted to play, but the next step was looking the part. Most LARPing groups I’ve read about require that their members dress in period garb, though most are generally pretty relaxed about this rule for newbies. However, with my experience cosplaying as well as an innate desire to always look like a badass, I went balls out on my Ranger garb.

"Your author obviously about to be wrist deep in babes"

I acquired my leather vest at a thrift store for $3. My gloves were Army surplus and cost $10. I found my cloak at a vintage shop for about $30. My baldric was a killer eBay find and ended up only being like $8. The Pièce de résistance was my leather shoulder armor which ran me about $60 and was another rad eBay purchase. All in all, I spent a little over $100 on my garb, though for the less invested, cloth for a simple tunic likely wouldn’t cost more than $10 at a fabric or craft store.

But enough about how kick-ass I looked. I was ready for my first event. And let me tell you, it. Was. Fucking. AWESOME! Seriously you guys, it was better than the first time I touched a boob. I fought with these nerdos for hours. I defeated a werewolf, joined forces with an order of middle-aged Knights, destroyed a mask of corruption and I even saw the goblin queen’s nip pop out of her corset. At the end of the day, I was exhausted, sore, battered, bruised and ready for more.

So now, forged anew in the fires of pretend war, I face the picnic tables full of snickering hipsters unafraid and without enough middle fingers for how much of a fuck I don’t give. I’m a LARPer and proud of it.

So fare thee well denizens of the internet. Hope to see you out there. Here’s some links to cool shit:

I could
have proselytized on Kant for that hipster girl who brought her bike to
the party, but I ended up getting stupid drunk and playing Magic the
Gathering with some kid. I lost, but it wasn't my deck so fuck.

And
I said some things I didn't mean to someone meaning never mattered to
anyway, but she's dead now, or she moved I don't remember.

I
was beautiful once. The kind of beautiful that made girls fuck me and
feed me. I had this way of leaving it unsaid that if they continued
fucking me and feeding me, I would write a novel about them someday.
Maybe I will yet, but I think its been done.

I'm
attracted to foreign currency. And if you ask me the value and meaning
of soap, I will fall in love with you, albeit briefly. I get turned on
when celebrities die. I enjoy awkward goodbyes. My personal record is
jerking off 11 times in one day, it remains unbroken since spring break
my freshman year in high school. I prefer spinach to lettuce. I prefer
Sarte to Camus, but this changes upon the density and color of the
clouds. I prefer Dostoevsky to Tolstoy in any weather.

Tell
me of yourself. I like to listen. Don't tell me of your likes and
dislikes or of things that happened to you or people you know or things
you have done or places you've seen. I mean, that's all fine, keeping it
simple is more fine however.

I
find cynics to be the true romantics. Smoke cigarettes and don't say
that you're thinking about quitting. At some point, bring your copy of
the Necronomicon to a cemetery and try to summon a demon. Understand why
bees are so important and also why lillies trump roses. Skip water
color and paint with oils.

"Holy art thou butterfly".What a load of shit, I thought to myself. Concernedonly with my missing,black socks I had precious littletime for that finger-snap, college bullshit.

The logo on my 100 percent recycled, paper cup readThe Sentient Bean...cute.Knowing outdoors would better tolerate my smoking habit,I made a hasty exit, jostlingseveral paint-smeared SCAD studentsand knocking over the microphone stand.The pretty girls all glaredand the boys continued desperately trying to hide their hard-onsbeneath the checkerboard tables."Philistines", said I"it's the closest thing to high art they've seen all day and all they can dois continue trying to fuck one anotherwithout appearing to be trying to fuck one another."

A little bell tinkled and I was without. Withoutwas much preferable to within.It was,however, much hotter and much more humid withoutand the lack of my socks notwithstanding,I began sweating.It poured from me torrentially.From my hair and neck and chest and underarms and the crack of my ass.Choked by the heat,I felt myself dripping down to the uneven concrete until I was nothingbut a puddle.The friction of Chuck Taylored feet against the sizzling pavementlivened my molecules a bitand though my eyebrows and a little of my lower intestine remainedto condense on the side of a tall glass of sweet tea from the cafe,a cool breeze whisked by and blew the rest of meout to sea.